Going native – Wine Blogging Wednesday #37

For the 37th edition of the original Wine Blogging Wednesday, Dr. Vino picked the theme ‘Going native’. Winelovers and bloggers all over the world are asked to taste wine of a grape variety that is native to the region it is grown in. Of course the big six – Riesling, Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and Pinot Noir – are excluded, even if you want to taste and discuss a wine from France.

Picking a native grape in Europe is a piece of cake, I am sorry to say. My first idea was to choose an Austrian Grüner Veltliner or an Italian Tocai Friulano. Or maybe a Spanish Monastrell, Portuguese Albariño or German Silvaner. In the end, we (my husband and I) came back to France. In the summer of 2006, we had a very nice wine experience. Dick Veerman, well known Dutch food blogger, took us to visit winemaker Thierry Navarre, who makes wine in the little town of Roquebrun, in the Languedoc (south of France). There we tasted an amazing array of wines; one of those wines was called Ribeyrenc.

The grape variety ribeyrenc is also known under the name aspiran. It is a grape that all but disappeared after the great phylloxera disaster in the late 19th century. Small pockets of the variety survived until 1956, when a big frost destroyed the remaining hectares. Thierry Navarre’s father was able to hold on to his rows of ribeyrenc, though, and Thierry himself is now trying to save this delicate grape variety from oblivion. With the help of local growers Navarre is planning to expand the area of ribeyrenc planted.

When this grape receives the attention it deserves, you will find in the glass something that has a strong resemblance to good Pinot Noir. At the moment, Navarre has still so little ribeyrenc planted that the wine isn’t advertised anywhere, not even in his own tasting room! Only friends, acquaintances and lovers of good wine are allowed to buy a few bottles of wine. We were fortunate enough to buy three bottles of this delicious wine. Navarre hopes that in a few years he will have enough vines to be able to produce more bottles of ribeyrenc.

Last Sunday we opened our remaining bottle of Ribeyrenc 2005, ‘Cépage oublié du Languedoc’ (forgotten Languedoc varietal). We drank it with ‘coq au vin’ (chicken in wine), a dish that goes well with Pinot Noir from Burgundy. What a treat that was, again! The wine smelled of delicate wild strawberries, and tasted fresh and fruity, with balanced acids, little tannins and a medium finish. The alcohol percentage was only 11%, fitting in with a new European trend towards wines with lower alcohol percentages! What a pity we had only one bottle left …

Wijnkronieken (Wine Chronicles) has decided to participate in the original Wine Blogging Wednesday. Although we are the initiators of `Wine Blogging Wednesday goes Dutch’, we always liked the original American idea better. The Dutch version of WBW used a different concept: we tasted two wines easily available in The Netherlands and compared tasting notes. Several months ago we decided to pull the plug from the Dutch version of WBW, because the response was disappointing.

At the time we did not give enough credit to Lenn Thompson’s original Wine Blogging Wednesday idea, although we rectified that later. By taking part in the original WBW, we hope to give real credit to Lenn’s highly original idea, still going strong after 37 editions.